


Diptych: "Secret Agents" and "Cosmic Love"

by Neshomeh



Series: Response Center 999: Supernumerary and Ilraen [9]
Category: Alex Rider - Anthony Horowitz, Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Protectors of the Plot Continuum, Twilight Series - Stephenie Meyer
Genre: Avada Kedavra, Bella is Sirius' and Remus' Daughter, Child Rescue, Co-Written, Crossover, Department of Bad Slash, Department of Fictional Psychology, Department of Implausible Crossovers, Department of Mary Sues, Mary Sue, Minor Sirius Black/Remus Lupin, Mpreg, PPC Mission, PPC Nursery, Spies & Secret Agents, Vampire Draco Malfoy, Vampire Harry, Vampire Luna Lovegood, Vampires, Werewolf Bella Swan, Werewolves, character replacement, fake family, mini-Aragogs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-07
Updated: 2012-01-26
Packaged: 2019-04-19 16:47:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 18,134
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14241606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Neshomeh/pseuds/Neshomeh
Summary: In which Ilraen is given a solo assignment and Nume doesn't like it.





	1. Introduction

As far as Ilraen was concerned, it was the morning, and he had just prepared for his morning ritual. After the last mission, he had had a long talk with Jenni in FicPsych and a good long think afterwards, and he had come to the conclusion that he needed more structure in his life. What better place to start than his long-neglected Andalite heritage?

<From the water that gave birth to us,> he began, and dipped his right forehoof in a bowl of water in front of him.

[BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!]

His hoof came down too hard and tipped the bowl, splashing water all over his grass-carpeted scoop under the bunk bed.

Calmly, he took a deep breath and then touched the acknowledge button to bring up the message. The ritual would have to wait for another day.

"What've we got now?" Nume asked, sticking his head out of the bathroom with a toothbrush between his teeth. "It better not be as bad as the last one. Please tell me they haven't stuck us with somebody else again!"

<No. This is just for me.> He re-read the message to be sure, but it was very clear. <I am to report to Agents Orken and Greenwall at Response Center 16,202,535.>

"Well," Nume started, but it came out more as a gurgle. He paused to spit the toothpaste into the sink and started again, clearly amused. "They can't be serious. If they need a consult for a crossover or something, I've been doing it longer. Give me five minutes and we'll both go." He ducked back into the bathroom.

<Agent Supernumerary, you have been working in this department exactly as long as I have. And . . . .> He fortified himself with a deep breath. <I do not want you to come.>

"What?" The man's hair, now half combed back, half sticking up, contributed to his baffled look. "Are you losing it? I'm your partner."

<I know that. And I know that this is a task I wish to do for myself.> He folded his arms and imitated the expression of looking over the top of glasses frames.

After a tense moment, Nume broke eye contact and shrugged. "Have it your way. Don't think you can come crying for help later on, though."

<I would not dream of it. I will have to borrow the equipment, of course.>

"If you break anything, I'll kill you." Nume waved him off.

<If I break anything, I will fix it,> Ilraen replied with a grin, or the nearest thing to it.

"Go away already! Jesus!"

Ilraen took the messenger bag and departed. Nume finished grooming himself and changed into his usual slacks and pinstripe shirt. Then, facing the prospect of a day with nothing to do—no assignments, no idiot partner trying to blow him up with a CAD, not even a chance of Jenni turning up to drag him to some farcical social function—he went to complain to his boss.


	2. Secret Agents

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Ilraen teams up with Agents Orken and Thomas to keep a Sue from marrying Alex Rider and infiltrating Hogwarts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Source fic:** ["Magic World"](https://www.fanfiction.net/s/6103900/1/Magic-World) by [The First Gatekeeper](http://www.fanfiction.net/u/2173252/The_First_Gatekeeper).  
>  **Continua:** _Alex Rider_ and _Harry Potter_.  
>  **Timeline:** Mid-2011.  
>  **Rating:** PG/K+ - It's okay, the badfic can't actually hurt you. Excessive head-banging might, though.  
>  **Beta:** Tranum.  
>  **Co-writer:** Guvnor of Space.

Orken 7861 had finally managed to make some headway into _The Grapes of Wrath_ when the alarm went off.

[Beep beep beep Beeeeep BEEEEEEEP! Beep Beep Beep Beeeeep BEEEEEEEP!]

O'Neil, who had spent the last several hours laboriously typing a message to Thomas using an Unas-to-English dictionary on the console, jumped back. Orken didn't even look at the message before hitting the button to shut off the alarm. Consequently, this brought the intelligence report up and erased O'Neil's message. The mini-Unas, just then remembering that he should have saved his letter regularly, gibbered angrily at Orken. Orken ignored him and began reading the report.

Thomas glanced up from _1984_ , having made almost no headway since borrowing it from Orken months before. He had just made it to Winston's musings about the Spies in chapter two, and had been distracted by thoughts of his days as a Boy Scout. The book was simply not holding his attention.

"What is it, Orky? More _Stargate_?"

Orken looked up. "Hm? Oh, no, Agent Thomas, it's an _Alex Rider_ , _Harry Potter_ crossover."

"Why're we getting it, then? Shouldn't it go to the untanglers?"

"Minor Mary Sue. They're sending us in to kill her, and sending us a detangler to get Alex back from the _Harry Potter_ 'verse. Or whatever it is they do," said Orken, grimacing.

"You don't know what they do?" Thomas asked, intrigued.

"I thought my time was best spent learning how to do my job, not looking into the affairs of another department," said Orken, his face turning slightly red.

Thomas grinned. "You sure looked into Luxury's affairs, dude. And she's a Bad Slasher."

"Agent Thomas, that was once! And I told you never to speak of it again." Orken turned away from him to hide his ever-reddening face.

Thomas giggled. Finally regaining control, he said, "So if they got alerted at the same time as us, this disentangler dude should already be on their way here, right?"

"Indeed, Agent Thomas. Try not to embarrass me."

"Who is it, dude? Maybe I know them."

"It is Agent Ilraen. I do not believe the two of you have met. I met him, briefly, a few months back."

"What's he like? What continuum is he from? Is he smarter than you? Tell me all about him, dude." Thomas jumped out of his chair and began rubbing his hands together. He loved meeting new people.

"You will meet him soon enough, Agent Thomas."

"Aww, you're no fun, Orky."

"Agent Thomas?"

"Yeeeessss?" Thomas gave his biggest and most annoying grin.

"Don't call me Orky."

A few minutes later, Ilraen arrived at the door to RC 16,202,535 and knocked. He had been surprised at the summons, but not more than his partner upon learning that it was for him alone. He was determined to make a good showing, both personally and as a disentangler, and he took care to stand squarely with his messenger bag settled so that the Flying Pig flash patch on the strap showed at his shoulder.

Thomas answered the door, a grin on his face. His expression turned to one of shock when he saw Ilraen. "Uh . . . Orky . . . it's one of those blue dudes from your continuum. Aren't you guys enemies or something?"

Orken, who was busy sorting through the contents of his backpack, rolled his eyes. "Yes, Agent Thomas, Agent Ilraen is an Andalite. I congratulate you for noticing that, and not letting your desire to greet him and invite him in get in the way. You know, silly things like manners."

Thomas, catching the sarcasm, held out his hand. "Uh . . . hi, dude. I'm Thomas."

<Hello,> Ilraen replied with what passed for a smile on a face with no mouth, shaking Thomas' hand without hesitation. <Please do not be concerned. Orken and I have met, and we were not enemies the last time I checked. In fact, I am happy for the chance to work with both of you.>

"Come in, then, dude." Thomas gestured at the inside of the RC, and moved out of the doorway grabbing his backpack. "Orky was just about finished packing, and then we're ready to leave."

"Indeed, Agent Thomas." Orken carefully placed two energy bars in a side pocket of his bag and hefted it onto his back. "As soon as we decide what disguises we will be using, we can get started."

Thomas shrugged. "Maybe wizarding robes? Possibly suits, to fit in at the fake bank."

In the midst of the discussion, Ilraen entered the room. He was about to inform them he didn't know the _Alex Rider_ continuum at all, so the disguises were entirely up to their discretion, but he was put off by a determined attack on his forelegs by a scaly-looking little creature with pronounced head ridges. He reared back on his hind legs in preparation for what was intended to be a graceful hop to the less cluttered side of the response center, but what a slipping hind hoof caused to be more of a floundering scramble to get all four legs back under him without stepping on the mini.

"O'Neil! Don't attack our guests. How many times have I told you that? Do you ever pay attention to me?" scolded Orken.

O'Neil stopped attacking Ilraen and restarted his tirade at Orken, yelling at him for not paying attention to what was on the console and erasing his letter.

Orken, of course, could not understand, and did his best to ignore the loudly gibbering mini. "I apologize for his behavior. We need to..." O'Neil got louder. Orken did the same. "We need to decide on..." O'Neil began gesticulating wildly, and increased his volume. "O'Neil, I understand you have some kind of grievance, and we shall address it later. For now, we need to prepare for..." O'Neil approached the top of his mini loudness range. Orken grabbed what looked like a mechanical hand from Thomas' side of the response center and threw it at O'Neil. The hand, having gone days without grabbing anything, snatched onto O'Neil, who yelped in surprise, but otherwise quieted. Orken cleared his throat. "We need to decide on a disguise and get going. We have dallied here long enough."

<I leave the disguises to you. I am not familiar with the primary continuum in this mission,> Ilraen said, eyeing O'Neil both to make sure he wasn't going to attack again and because he was puzzled by the whole exchange. <What do you suppose your little friend was so adamant about just now? He certainly was trying very hard to be heard.>

"I dunno. He and bunch of other minis pinned me to the floor one time and threatened me with a letter opener. He's always angry about something," Thomas piped in.

Orken shrugged. "If there was some way to communicate with him, things would be simpler. As it is, we have to guess. It isn't anything urgent, I assure you. We keep him well fed and he has free range of Thomas' side of the response center. Whatever it is, we will address it when we get back. On a more pressing topic, we have to choose disguises. It would appear that this will be Thomas' decision."

Thomas thought it over for a second. "I say we do suits. We can pretend to be guards again. That usually works on Sues. I guess it makes them think they're important. So just a . . . ." He glanced at Ilraen. "Uh, dude, quick question. I know you guys can do the whole turning into other things . . . thing, so would you rather do that now, or just let the disguise generator change you?"

<I find it simpler to rely on the disguise generator, but thank you for asking,> Ilraen answered. <For one thing, no two-hour limit.>

Orken punched in the necessary settings on the console and opened a portal. "Shall we go, Agents?" He stepped through.

"Can't think of anything we're forgetting," said Thomas, shrugging.

<If there is anything, we will improvise,> Ilraen assured him, and followed Orken into the fic. His usual red-headed, somewhat androgynous and youthful human form appeared to have been aged a few years to suit the role of a security guard. His chest and shoulders were filled out, tipping the scales definitively toward the masculine side. The suit helped, too.

Orken looked almost unchanged, except for the suit, which looked right on him.

Thomas' long hair had been replaced by a much shorter cut, and he looked at least seven years older. He also looked very uncomfortable in the suit. He pulled at his tie. "All right, dudes. This fic starts in what's supposed to be a bank, but is really a secret headquarters for M16. So that's why we're wearing suits as guards, not, ya know, security uniforms."

Shortly after noting this, an author's note blared in their heads.

> **This is my new fanfic, enjoy !**
> 
> **I do not own Alex Rider or Harry Potter :(**

The frowny face was especially grating on the brain. Then, the narrative declared,

> **Alex POV**

Orken grumbled. "That should be apparent if the author is doing their job right."

"Worse," Ilraen responded in a pleasant, if slightly nervous, tenor, "it means we can expect point of view shifts in the future."

Thomas paled. "No! Not cyclical POV changes again! I can't go back, dude!"

"You and I are of like mind, Agent Thomas." Seized with a moment of alarm, Ilraen searched quickly through his messenger bag before sighing with relief at finding a half-full bottle of Bleepka in the bottom. He repositioned it so it was on top, in easy reach.

"Good to hear, dude," said Thomas, eyeing the Bleepka with jealousy. Diverting his gaze, he said, "Yeah, I didn't repair the dummy from our last mission yet, so if we hit first person, things might get . . . interesting. Do you have a dummy?"

Ilraen shook his head. "We have not needed one, so far."

"Lucky. We've needed it twice so far. Last time there were random switches between first and third person and it created two copies of the Sue. It . . . it wasn't pretty. If that happens . . . I dunno, dude."

"It may not come to that. It is likely just regular bad writing," Orken said consolingly.

> Alex Rider was called to the Royal and General, again.
> 
> He was eighteen now and Jack had left to go and live in America, so he lived by himself.
> 
> He was also a fully fleged MI6 agent.
> 
> He went to university (Yes he managed to get there) in London and still lived in the same house.
> 
> Anyway, as Alex entered the Royal and General, he was greeted by the secretary.
> 
> "Hello Mr. Rider"
> 
> "Hello Miss Hart"

Thomas began banging his head on a conveniently placed wall. "Ugh. He would never voluntarily join MI6. Even if he did, how could a full fledged agent go to school at the same time? Why does the author say 'anyway'? THIS MAKES NO SENSE!"

"He might be like this the entire time. I hope you do not terribly mind keeping a charge list?" Orken said apologetically.

Ilraen was surprised. "I never thought of it. Usually my partner does that, but let me see." He delved back into the messenger bag and eventually came up with the nub of a pencil and a cloth napkin filched from Rivendell. He tried to write on it, but quickly gave up when all he could manage was something that looked like a drunk dwarf had tried to scribble some dirty runes. "Um. I don't suppose I could borrow a piece of paper . . . ? Sorry."

"He has the notebook we usually use," he said, gesturing to Thomas. He tried to get his attention. "Agent Thomas. We need to note down charges."

Thomas took a break from banging his head on the wall and looked up at Orken. "Charges . . . right, dude. I'll do that."

"If you wish to give up the notebook and continue your self-injury, Agent Ilraen is willing to note down charges."

Thomas gave the wall a longing look, but shook his head. "No, dude, I think I've got it." He pulled out the notebook and began writing.

Meanwhile, Alex reached the elevator.

> Alex walked to the lift and pressed the button for Alan Blunt.

"Ugh. Alan Blunt doesn't have his own private floor. It should be for the floor his office is on. I'm charging for making elevators move in ways they weren't meant to," Thomas grumbled.

Orken gave the Words a glance. "We should get on that elevator." As he said it, the doors to the elevator opened. "Hurry!"

The three agents sprinted across the lobby, encumbered by the suits they were wearing, jumping through the elevator doors just before they closed. A second later, they opened.

> Alex left the lift and entered the office.

Thomas groaned and noted down a charge for distorting space.

> "Hello Alex" said Mr. Blunt
> 
> "What do you want me to do this time ?" asked Alex
> 
> "We want you to infiltrate a special school, a magic school" replied Blunt
> 
> "What ! There's no such thing as magic !" shouted Alex
> 
> "Yes there is. All the mist lately is from the guards from the wizard prison who have joined Voldemort, the maniac villain of the wizard world" replied Blunt
> 
> "How are you going to get me in ? I'm not 14 anymore" questioned Alex
> 
> "You are going to be a teacher, someone who came to the school for protection with your wife and son"
> 
> "What ? Wife and son ?"
> 
> "Yes, wife and son. We're borrowing them from the ASIS. The should be here about now."

The period-less dialogue sounded oddly like an enormous run-on sentence as spoken by the two characters.

Thomas began banging his head on the wall again. His speech was distorted by the constant impacts, sometimes being completely obscured by the banging noises. "He just accepts all that? How—" a series of especially rapid bangs made it temporarily impossible to understand what he was saying, before he could be heard again. "He doesn't ask for proof—" more loud bangs— "he's smarter than that! A man he very much does not trust, who actively deceives him to manipulate him throughout the series, tells him magic is real and then, unquestioningly, Alex believes him? Dude, this fic is hurting my brain."

"In addition, he is a Muggle," Ilraen started, but Thomas' head-walling became too much for him. He didn't know whether Orken's partner was the type to lash out, but he put a hand on his shoulder anyway. "Agent Thomas, please stop. Since Orken and I are not familiar with this canon, we need your expertise. In fact, why not tell us more about it? I would be interested to learn."

Thomas stopped the banging, and shook his head. "The short answer is 'What if James Bond were fourteen and didn't have a different girl every movie?'" Thomas stopped and thought for a second. "Uh . . . lessee. The main character there is Alex Rider, who for the series is fourteen. MI6 uses him for all sorts of spy jobs because no one would suspect a kid. He's smart, athletic, and gets plenty of gadgets, so yeah, dudes, he's pretty much a teenage version of James Bond. The only thing is, like a sane person, he doesn't like being in danger, so they have to blackmail him into doing anything in the first place. Oh, and there's cool gadgets and a space station in one of the books, and other stuff like that, which is probably why us Sci-Fi dudes got called in."

Meanwhile, the two aforementioned spies from the Australian Secret Intelligence Service showed up, stepping through the elevator door.

> Just then a beautiful young woman came in carriying a little boy.

"What. No. No. No!" said Thomas, aghast.

Orken slapped his hand over Thomas' mouth and said tersely, "Sue! Be quiet."

Ilraen clenched his fist around his bag's shoulder strap. "This does not bode well. Why must they involve children? And how can a boy small enough to be carried serve as a useful spy?"

Orken nodded in agreement. "I think that was my partner's rather inarticulate point."

> "Hi, I'm Alyssa and this is Thomas" said Alyssa
> 
> "Alex, this is your new partner" said Blunt
> 
> "Hello Alyssa, Thomas, I'm Alex" Alex announced to his new partners

"She stole my name? Sue's gonna die . . . " Thomas muttered. The continued lack of periods and the sheer speed of the dialogue were doing nothing to improve his mood.

After being dismissed, Alex and his two supposed partners stepped into the elevator. Orken jumped in after them, followed by Thomas the agent and Ilraen. The Sue gave him a suspicious look.

Orken straightened his tie and effected a thoroughly awful British accent. "We're security. Don't want anything to happen to you before this very important mission you're going on."

The Sue nodded. "Very good! I'm glad to see that nothing will get in our way of defeating Voldemort."

Thomas made a strained gurgling noise. Ilraen offered a smile, but it was not something he was particularly good at even at the best of times.

> Alex tried to start a conversation.
> 
> "So...How long have you been with ASIS ?" asked Alex
> 
> "I've been with them for two years now" responded Alyssa
> 
> "How are you really related to Thomas ?"
> 
> "He's my brother actually" Alex noted that she was shy
> 
> "And what's your story ?" he asked
> 
> "Story ?"
> 
> "Every spy has a story of how he or she got into the business"
> 
> "My story ? Well...My parents were in gangs and drugs, my Mum cheated on Dad and Thomas was the result. My Dad was drunk when he found out, he killed Mum and she told me to take Thomas and go to a shop in Sydney. It turned out that it was the ASIS HQ"

Thomas muttered something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like "that makes no sense at all," but the Sue didn't seem to notice. Just then the elevator conveniently opened on the ground floor of the Royal and General. Alex, the Sue, and small!Thomas stepped out of the elevator, followed by the agents.

> "Mumma" a voice came from Thomas

Luckily for the agents, the Word World was smart enough to know which Thomas was being referred to.

> "Yes Tommy" came the awnser
> 
> "I hungry"
> 
> "OK honey, I'll ask Daddy if he knows a place to eat"
> 
> "There's a restuarant that's good for kids just round the corner" replied Alex without having to be asked
> 
> As they reached the car park Alex walked towards a four door saloon
> 
> They all got in the car and Alex started driving.

"Wait. They just got a super secret mission and now they're going out to eat. This fic is so stupid. Gimme one second to refresh myself." Thomas began hitting his head into a parked car.

Ilraen, not content to stand by and watch and emboldened by his previous success, gently seized Thomas' head and steered him away from any solid objects. "I recently experienced first-hand how to restrain someone for his own good," he said. "I have not tried it yet, but I may."

Thomas looked longingly at the car. "But the hitting keeps the bad out!"

"That does not make sense," Ilraen said, letting go. "How does giving yourself a headache or a concussion keep the bad _out?_ " He shook his head and turned toward Orken, plainly wondering how long he was going to allow this to continue.

Thomas seemed to think this over. "Well, when I'm hitting my head on things, I'm thinking 'ow, dude, this hurts' not 'why is a secret agent taking the time to go to a family restaurant?' I guess it's just my gut reaction."

Orken shrugged. "He never asked for Bleeprin, and for the next couple weeks he can't have any, anyway. This seemed to keep him from doing anything too stupid—he has a thick head and has never done more than break the skin a bit, and it's less likely to alert a Sue than him yelling about vegetables and Roman emperors. It isn't like he's slamming his head into things full force."

"You of all people should know how delicate the human brain is," Ilraen said, displeased with Orken's opinion now that he'd heard it. He folded his arms. "It can only take so much punishment, badfic or otherwise."

Orken glowered at him. "He's fine. He hasn't suffered any sort of permanent damage. When Medical checked out his brain after his Bleeprin overdose, they didn't see anything else wrong. A little light head-banging isn't going to kill him."

Thomas gave the other two agents a confused look. "Uh . . . dudes. I'm right here. You can stop talking like I'm a little kid. I'm technically an adult—"

Orken didn't seem to hear him. "And furthermore, even if it was causing him brain damage, he isn't complaining about it. He is independent from me, as he so often likes to remind me, and if this is how he feels he can best remain sane, I trust him. Trust me, Agent Ilraen, it is best not to get too close to your partners."

Ilraen scowled right back. "Part of an agent's duty is to stop his partner when he is acting insane. That is why we _have_ partners."

Orken looked flushed. "THIS is not insane. Having him yell about how Constantine is a 'righteous dude' is much crazier than having him hit his head into things. I mean, without Bleeprin, if the fic is bad enough, that's what he'll do! You have no clue as to how preferable this is to having him go insane! You've never—" He was interrupted by Thomas, who had had quite enough.

"Orken! Shut up! You're the one who's always talking about professionalism. I might not be an expert, but dude, this looks pretty damn unprofessional. And you!" Thomas turned his glare on Ilraen, who took a step back as though bodily struck.

"I don't hit my head hard enough to do any real damage," continued Thomas. "It hurts, but it isn't dangerous. Dude, stay out of my business. Orken would stop me if this ever got real bad. He cares a lot more about me than he would have you believe." Orken looked as if he wanted to refute that, but decided against it. "If he bothered to shut up for THREE SECONDS so I could say that, maybe we wouldn't have had this argument."

"I apologize. I only meant to avoid seeing anyone hurt," Ilraen said, unconsciously hunching his shoulders.

Orken nodded. With a great amount of authority, he said, "Apology accepted. Now we must move on, and—"

"Orky!"

Orken grimaced. "I apologize for my unprofessional argument. I should have let Thomas explain himself." His voice lowered somewhat. "Trust me when I say this, Age—Ilraen, the last thing I want is to see my partner come to serious harm." He clapped his hands together, as if he could physically dispel the uncomfortable atmosphere that had descended on the agents. Thomas, at least, seemed satisfied. "Now. We need to portal to Alex Rider's house, and catch back up with the Sue." He opened a portal. "Shall we go?"

The three agents stepped through the portal, emerging in what was presumably the entryway of Alex's house.

Orken gestured to positions on either side of the door. "Pretend to be guards. They're about to come in."

Alex and his two "partners" "arrived at Alex' house which had the Austrailiens bags in the hall."

The "Austrailiens" took on the form of two black-haired women who were almost identical except for their clothes and the fact that one of them was Aeryn Sun and the other was Vala Mal Doran. They both had bags. Also, they both looked pissed.

Thomas rubbed his eyes. "Uh . . . dude . . . there are two tiny Valas. Why . . . I guess those are Austrailiens? What in the name of Apophis are we going to do with them?"

"One of them is Aeryn Sun of the _Farscape_ continuum," said Ilraen, who had finally watched the series after several missed references too many. "I suppose the term could apply if you wanted to get meta. And spell it better," he added after a glance at the Words.

The Sue and her brother, meanwhile, were carried upstairs by Alex. He snagged Vala and Aeryn along the way. Soon after, Alex and the two "spies" were asleep.

Orken removed the RA from his pocket. "We should skip ahead to the next morning." He opened a portal and gestured to it. "Shall we go?"

Thomas jumped through, followed by Ilraen and Orken.

The three agents emerged in the exact same entryway, the next morning. Orken frowned at the Words. "Hmm. That child-thing is about to wake Alex up. We should get somewhere where we can listen to what they're saying . . . they don't specify that there is a kitchen, so I assume that that will all happen here." He glanced into the next room and spied a generic couch. "That should work." All three agents hid behind the couch, just as Alex came down the stairs.

> "I'll get you breakfast, just don't wake Mumma" pleaded Alex, knowing that Alyssa would want some sleep
> 
> "OK, Daddy"
> 
> They went downstairs and Alex got out some cereal for him and Tommy.

Thomas snickered as Alex pulled a box of cereal out of thin air.

> "So...Tommy, do you like me ?" asked Alex
> 
> "Of course I do, you're my Daddy"

"I may be wrong," Ilraen said, gripping the strap of his bag, "but I do not believe a child of this age should accept a strange man as his 'daddy' so easily. He is old enough to reason at a basic level, and to know the difference between someone who cares for him as a friend or as a parent. This is wrong." He gave the strap a decisive twist.

The Sue joined the other two at the base of the stairs and the two began discussing Blunt.

> "Why don't you like Blunt ?" asked Alyssa
> 
> "I don't like him because, when my uncle died, he made me take his place at the age of 14 and after that I became MI6's secret weapon, any mission that I went on was a mission that other agents had tried and died on. For example on my 4thmission(skeleton key), the other two agents with me were killed and the enemy shot himself because I reminded him of his dead son and on my 6th mission(SCORPIA) I was shot 3 cm from the heart" Alex explained

Thomas began banging his head into the (thankfully soft) couch. "You are listing all the reasons you should be more upset about Blunt getting kids involved! Dude, this is just . . . gah!"

"I do not believe that those parentheses should be in the middle of dialogue like that. At least it's not as bad as that _SG-1_ Stu we killed a while back," Orken said, a look of disgust in his eyes.

Thomas grimaced.

" _Why_ must they involve children?" Ilraen wondered again as the boy, Tommy, started crying over Alex's story. The agent moved as though about to get up, then thought better of it and settled again. "How much more of this is there?"

"I dunno. And see, that's my point exactly, Ilraen. I mean, in the books Alex is fourteen, so at least he's able to fend for himself and think. Not-me-Thomas over there is way too little," he said, gesturing at the child in question.

Orken glanced at the Words. "There is still far too much of this." He pulled out the remote activator. "It's time to resume guard duty."

The three agents were once again in Alan Blunt's office, and got into position in front of the uncanonical elevator just as it opened and the three young "spies" stepped out.

> "OK Alex, this mission will be one of your toughest yet" stated Blunt "And your cover has been dificult to create and there are some complications that we are going to sort out right now"
> 
> "What kind of complications, Alan ?" Alex asked sweetly
> 
> "Well.."Blunt looked embarrassed(Does that even happen?)"You two have to officially get married"

Thomas' mouth opened wide enough to catch a score of flies. "Wha . . . ?"

> "What?" Alex and Alyssa almost screamed
> 
> "Yes, I know you're going to hate me-"
> 
> "Like I don't already" Alex muttered under his breath
> 
> "-, so I'm going to do this quickly" Blunt finished "Because I'm the head of MI6, I have the right to marry you in the eyes of the law, so please come before me"

Thomas would likely have tried to rush the Sue if he hadn't been in shock. A very short marriage ceremony was performed, and the agents finally got their explanation as to why it was happening.

> "Why did we have to get married ?"
> 
> "Because the most powerful wizards have a way of seeing if your telling the truth" explained Blunt

Ilraen opened and closed his mouth a couple of times before he could answer the confused looks he was getting from the other two. "Technically that is true," he finally said in a rush, "but irrelevant! Veritaserum, for instance, would force them to unravel the full story with the proper questions, marriage or no marriage. Is Alex not a spy? Should he not try to avoid a situation in which he might be interrogated in the first place? This is . . . ." He shook his head. "I am fairly certain 'forcing arranged marriages' is on most of the PPC Basic Charge Sheets."

Thomas looked a little sheepish. "He's a James Bond spy. He gets caught at least once per book . . . although it's still a stupid plan."

The Sue and her two male companions got into the elevator to go to a different part of the building. Orken gestured for the agents to join them.

The Sue looked pleased to see them. "I feel safer knowing you guys are here to protect us, even if I can protect myself."

Orken just nodded. Thomas had to cover his mouth to avoid a spurt of laughter.

The elevator arrived in Smithers' lab, with its vast array of gadgets. Thomas looked around hungrily, imagining all the fun he could have with them. Luckily for him, Smithers was about to give some to the Sue and Alex, which he was sure would have to be secured for the good of canon. The scientist, who was possibly the only non- _Simpsons_ Smithers in any canon, began handing out the things the spies would need for the mission.

> "Great, first, here are the rings, if you speak into your ring the other person with the ring will be able to hear you and if you twist it once on your finger you will be able to talk directly to Mr. Blunt" Smithers explained as he gave them there there rings

"Not at Hogwarts, they won't," Ilraen muttered. "Technology and magic do not mix. One more reason this plot is nonsense."

> "Me want something pretty too" objected Tommy
> 
> "Here you go little fella, I got you something for you too" he said as he gave Tommy a picture book on wizards fairytales
> 
> "For you, Alex and you, Alyssa X-ray sunglasses" he said as he gave them the sunnies
> 
> "Your guns Alex" he said as he gave Alex his handgun and sniper rifle

Thomas almost commented about Alex never being given guns (by MI6, at least) before realizing that he was supposedly eighteen now, so that probably wasn't a charge.

> "And for you Alyssa, this necklace has four different beads on it two green and two red, the green one's give off sleeping gas and the red one's explode when you take them off" explained Smithers "I've also packed all your clothes in some trunks plus some cloaks and smaller cloaks for Thomas"

Thomas was practically drooling by this point. "So much stuff to take . . . dudes . . . ."

"That necklace strikes me as a bad idea," Ilraen cautioned. "Simply removing a bead activates it immediately, it seems. You could lose a hand."

"Still cool," said Thomas, shrugging.

Orken was looking at the Words again. "Hurry. We need to get to some sort of hidden train platform. We'll confront the Sue, and Ilraen can take Alex back to his canon." The supposed Hogwarts infiltrators left the lab and Orken opened a portal.

The three agents emerged on Platform Nine and Three-Quarters just as their targets made it through the magical barrier. Something seemed off about what was going on around them. For one, Alex was popping in and out of existence, sometimes eighteen, sometimes eight, and sometimes not there at all. It was kind of like watching someone moving under a strobe light. Thomas groaned when he realized what was happening.

"Dudes . . . uh, Alex Rider may not have the most stable timeline in the worlds. There may be some contradictions about his age. I'm guessing _Harry Potter_ is better?"

Ilraen nodded. "The years of the books are firmly established, and the fandom has pieced together a great deal else besides. Let me see . . . if they are actively fighting Voldemort, this must be at least fifth year, after he returned. Dolores Umbridge would be the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, not that anyone would miss that woman."

Thomas nodded. "Okay. Uh, we should probably snatch those guys off the train. Orken and I will take the Sue, and you can do whatever it is you dudes do with Alex."

"Yes. If you take the Sue and the child, I will stay back and handle the canon characters, then catch up to you. Don't kill her before I get back, however, or the plan will fail."

The three agents clambered aboard the Hogwarts Express, eliciting a few puzzled looks from random students who weren't used to seeing adults on the train at all, let alone in Muggle suits. However, the looks slid off them as soon as they landed thanks to the combination of the Sue's presence changing things to accommodate the idea and their own SEP fields. They found Alyssa, Tommy, and Alex sharing a compartment with Harry, Ron, and Hermione. It was a bit cramped, since the compartments usually only sat three or four students, even with Tommy on his "mother's" lap. Ilraen squeezed his way all the way to the back, up against the window. Everyone stared at him, and he cleared his throat awkwardly.

"Um. Ma'am," he addressed the Sue, "please go with my colleagues. There is . . . a situation, which only you can . . . that is—"

Thomas interrupted him, trying to fake a British accent. "What my colleague here means is . . . ." His fake accent, which had started to sound Australian, reverted itself when he cleared his throat. "Our rather _blunt_ friend here is supposed to be telling you there's an urgent matter that needs to be discussed in private, eh?" His accent had ended up sounding Canadian.

"'Aren't you a bit old to go to Hogwarts ?'" Hermione asked suddenly, staring straight ahead with a fixed expression. It seemed as though she knew something was wrong, but couldn't get off-script.

"It's okay," Alyssa said. "These men are my guards." She stood up, taking Tommy with her. There was a bit of a shuffle as she tried to get out of the compartment with Thomas in the doorway, until finally Orken went one way, he went another, and Alyssa emerged in the middle.

As soon as they were out of sight of the open doorway, Thomas had his knife at the Sue's throat. "Don't move."

Orken took Tommy in his arms, keeping one hand over his mouth. Awkwardly, he opened a portal to the beach he usually used for Sue executions. The two agents stepped through, leaving Ilraen alone on the train.

For a moment, the canon characters stared at the ginger "security guard," and he stared right back at them.

"'I'm Hermione Granger, this is Ronald Weasly and that is Harry Potter'," Hermione said, breaking the silence. The mini-Aragog, Ronald Weasly, popped into existence on the seat next to her, looking as disgruntled as an eight-legged little monster can.

Ilraen shook himself and pulled a neuralyzer and his sunglasses from pockets under the messenger bag's flap. "Yes. That is almost correct—I believe you missed an _e_ in 'Weasley', but it is not your fault. Please look this way, everyone." They already were, but it didn't hurt to make sure. The mini, on the other hand, had the sense to face the back of the seat and shut his eyes instead. The neuralyzer flashed, and the memories of the past couple of days faded with the glare.

"Now," Ilraen said, turning to Alex, "You are Alex Rider, you do not believe in magic, and you have never heard of Voldemort, Harry Potter, or Hogwarts, unless the books exist in your world. You are going to give me the things Mister Smithers gave you today, and then you are going to forget about them. When you go home, you will be fourteen and none of this will have ever happened."

Alex, complacent as he was throughout the fic, handed over the gold ring and the X-ray sunglasses without a fuss. Ilraen opened a portal to the boy's home 'verse and gave him a nudge to send him along, then turned his attention to the three _Harry Potter_ characters.

"You three . . . ." He paused a moment to think about it once more. "You three are beginning your sixth year," he declared. "The Ministry was forced to admit Voldemort's return and share the information with the Muggle government after the battle in the atrium at the end of your fifth year. Ron and Hermione, you are prefects, and you have duties. You will go about them after I am gone. Harry, you have to go spy on Draco Malfoy. None of you have ever heard of Alex Rider and you never saw me or my friends."

The canon characters cleared out of the compartment as soon as he stopped talking. Setting his remote activator to "Home in on Sue," he hoisted Alex's and Alyssa's bags through and came after them, Ronald Weasly scuttling along behind.

Orken and Thomas had switched positions. Thomas was standing off to the side, holding Tommy by the hand. Orken had the Sue on her back, with his knife at her throat. He barely glanced up when Ilraen stepped through his portal.

Thomas, on the other hand, was practically bouncing up and down. "Can we charge her now? She keeps accusing us of being traitors, and it's getting really annoying."

Ilraen blinked in surprise. "Yes, of course. I only said not to kill her so I could find you again."

Thomas pulled a notebook from his pocket. Tommy was looking about, utterly confused. Thomas began reading.

"Alyssa of ASIS, you are hereby charged with distorting the character of Alex Rider in a plethora of fashions, including but not limited to: making him far too trusting of Alan Blunt; making him join MI6, despite his hatred of being a spy and only doing it because of blackmail; making him accept the existence of magic far too easily; and giving him little objection to officially marrying you."

"Traitors! What is this madness? Let me go!" The Sue was of course trying to put on a defiant act. Thomas and Orken rolled their eyes in tandem, though neither noticed.

"You are also charged with distorting the physical makeup of the Royal and General Bank, having a brother with annoying and incredibly non-realistic dialogue, marrying Alex Rider with flimsy justification, having a bad and poorly thought-out cover for your mission that required the aforementioned charge, trying to go undercover in a school for magic while being a Muggle yourself, combining the _Alex Rider_ and _Harry Potter_ continua, which take place at least ten years apart, having really cool gadgets you don't deserve—"

"Agent Thomas!" Orken barked.

"Fine, fine, not that last one. Creating two 'Austrailiens', creating the mini Ronald Weasly, having a fear of periods, and finally, being a Mary Sue. The penalty is death. Any last words?"

The Sue spit in Orken's face. "Traitors! You were supposed to be my guards!"

Thomas laughed. "I should've also charged you with being stupid enough to fall for that, dude. Orky?" He turned Tommy away from his partner. "Don't look, dude."

Orken quickly slit the Sue's throat, getting glittery blood all over the sand and himself. "All done, Agent Thomas."

"Anything else you need to do, dude?" Thomas was looking at Ilraen.

"We may wish to neuralyze Alan Blunt and Mister Smithers, since they came in contact with Alyssa," Ilraen said. "Or at least make certain they are in character now."

"Good idea, dude. Orky?"

Orken stood up, wiping his glittery knife off on his pants, making a note to wash them later. "I'll take care of it." He portaled off the beach.

"Hmmm . . . " said Thomas, contemplating what to do with the Sue. He thought for a couple minutes, before Tommy tugged on his hand.

"Can me look now?" It seemed that even with the Sue gone, his annoying speech patterns remained.

Thomas shook his head. "Not yet, dude. Stay here." He'd been trying to think of something more creative, but this would have to work. "Ilraen, do you mind if I borrow your RA? Orken has ours."

"Certainly. I will watch the boy." He traded his remote activator for Tommy's hand. "You know," he addressed the child, "it is better to say 'can I' instead of 'can me' when asking a question. Why don't you try it?"

Thomas opened a portal to the uncreative backup solution he had come up with. The exploding Ark Angel space station would do an adequate job of destroying the Sue's body. He searched the Sue, grabbing her necklace before throwing her through the portal.

Shortly after that, Orken arrived back from his neuralyzations. "That should be it. I think we can go."

Thomas was rooting through the Sue's and Alex's extra-canonical trunks, pulling out the gadgets, as well as the guns. He slung the generic sniper rifle across his back. "Dude! This is going to look great on the wall. We done here?"

Orken opened a portal, before turning to Ilraen. "Ilraen. It was a pleasure to work with you. I . . . was out of line to argue with you like I did. You were only concerned for my partner. I am . . . sorry."

"I did overreact," Ilraen replied, smiling sheepishly at Thomas in the disconcerting manner he had before facing Orken again.

Thomas returned the smile, his being far more real-looking and far less unsettling.

"In any case," Ilraen went on, "the Flower-Princes assigned a Yeerk and an Andalite on a mission together. If we didn't fight at least once, Legal would surely be upset." He grinned, which was even worse.

Orken stuck out his hand, and Ilraen took it. "Perhaps next time we won't fight."

Thomas had a sudden thought. "Uh, dudes, as much as I like the whole 'former enemies making up' deal, what ever happened to the two Valas?"

As if on cue, there was a thumping sound from the Sue's trunk. Pulling a robe off of her head, the miniature Vala pulled herself up and over the side. She looked very pissed, and so did the miniature Aeryn who climbed out behind her. This one pulled an equally miniature pulse pistol out of a holster at her hip and aimed it at Thomas' eyes.

"All right," she squeaked, "somebody had better start talking, now."

She was very serious, deadly serious, in fact, but with that voice it was no wonder Tommy started giggling, and Ilraen had to take his hand back in order to mask his own amusement.

"Look at her! She's so cute and angry!" said Thomas with a goofy look on his face.

Orken rolled his eyes. "She's pointing a gun at you, Agent Thomas."

"So? It's so little. Like her!"

The mini-Vala looked up at the "giant" agents with amusement. "You know, I like my men big, but this is ridiculous. Would any of you care to explain what is going on?"

"Um," Ilraen began as he often did when suddenly placed on the spot. "You see, you were brought here because someone wrote a story and used a word that does not exist, and so the Word World had to find something to fulfill the apparent meaning. I'm sorry you were treated as luggage," he added, scuffing one foot in the sand under tiny!Aeryn's unimpressed stare. "But we can take you someplace better." Tiny!Aeryn was even less impressed. "And prove everything."

Finally, she put the weapon away. "Fine. It's too insane to be a lie."

Orken nodded. "Excellent. If you don't mind taking care of these two, and the child, of course, we will be going." Before Ilraen could say anything, Orken had stepped through a portal. Thomas gave Ilraen and apologetic look. "He does that, dude. You need any help?"

"In fact, yes. You still have my remote activator."

Thomas' face turned red when he realized he had almost stranded Ilraen. "Uh, sorry, dude." He handed over the remote activator. The portal Orken had opened began making threatening sputtering noises. "See you around!" Thomas said as he hopped through.

"It was nice meeting—" Ilraen called before the portal closed. "—you."

Two Austrailiens, a mini-Aragog, and a boy all looked up expectantly at him. He sighed. Apparently this was how the multiverse rewarded agents who thought they were ready for more responsibility. Ilraen had never seen a public service announcement, but just then he could have written one. Nume was going to kill him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, despite the fact that it took about six months to get this mission out (during the beta phase, Guvnor had summer camp and I had a wedding and then a honeymoon), it was a lot of fun to do, and it was interesting getting Ilraen out of Nume's shadow for once. What does Nume do with his free time? Check out "Cosmic Love" to find out!
> 
> This is the first time I've used a title for the mission that's different from that of the badfic, but in this case I'm keeping consistent with Guvnor's spin-off. I've hosted the mission here, but I'm the guest in this story.
> 
> Incidentally, we know the "Austrailiens" joke is a little obscure. Try Googling Vala Mal Doran, Aeryn Sun, and Claudia Black for more information.
> 
> Edit (03.03.12): Guvnor and I ended up less than satisfied with certain elements of this mission, so a fair bit of retooling was done to the dialogue, especially regarding O'Neil the mini-Unas and the fight between the three agents. Also, we found out "saloon" is actually a legitimate British term for a sedan, so we couldn't keep the part where we made fun of it. Alas.
> 
> **Guvnor's Notes:** Fun fact: in the _Alex Rider_ series, the _Harry Potter_ books exist. ( _Point Blanc_ , or _Point Blank_ , depending on where you live, has one used as a knockout-dart launcher.) That leads to an odd meta spin on this mission. It also adds to the implausibility of the crossover. I'd also like to point out that there are what look like three large charges we missed, but do not fear, as these charges are all based on information from the last book of the _Alex Rider_ series, which came out after the last update on this fic.


	3. Cosmic Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which love is found in all the wrong places.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Source fic:** ["Cosmic Love"](https://www.fanfiction.net/s/6475384/1/Cosmic-Love) by [Izzie Jackson](http://www.fanfiction.net/u/1189081/Izzie_Jackson).  
>  **Continua:** _Twilight_ and _Harry Potter_.  
>  **Timeline:** Mid-2011; shortly after ["The Misadventures of Phobos, Part One – Bad Slash."](http://starshadowhall.tripod.com/ppc/phobos/phobos1.html)  
>  **Rating:** PG-13/T - MPreg, swearing, and more closet jokes than is healthy.  
>  **Beta:** JulyFlame.  
>  **Co-writer:** Phobos.

The Lichen was not accustomed to having agents in his office shouting at him. He was not the Sunflower Official; he was not nearly so well known, and hadn't nearly so many people working for him. For that reason, he didn't even have a place on the Board of Department Heads anymore. And, if he said so himself, he was far more genial than his peers. He really didn't deserve this.

 _Are you quite finished?_ he asked when Nume finally seemed to have exhausted his laundry list of grievances. Or possibly his lung capacity. Lungs were overrated, and oxygen, too. _Would you like a cool beverage, perhaps? I understand these things help._

Nume glared. "Don't condescend to me. I don't care if you do sound like John Cleese; it's not cute. I want to know why you're trying to ruin my partner. It's been one thing after another for the last few years, and I've had it. First Sues, then all these damned co-missions, and now sending him off with a Yeerk, for Christ's sake. What's next, dammit?"

The Lichen was silent while he considered the question. What sort of answer would be least likely to result in further bollocking? _Perhaps I misjudged,_ he said at last.

"Too right!"

_Perhaps granting you some time apart from Agent Ilraen to relax and recuperate yourself was not the right idea after all._

Nume's expression quickly flipped from outrage to what can only be described as "oh, shit." Very good.

 _The Queen Anne's Lace tells me one of her agents has been in need of a partner for some time now,_ the Lichen went on, blithely talking over the protests that sprang from Nume's mouth at the mention of the Bad Slash director. _Perhaps a change of pace is just what you need. Yes, I think so. I believe Agent Decima is in the Department of Fictional Psychology. I will make sure a mission is sent to her console. Now, bugger off like a good lad._

* * *

" . . . and I don't know what happened. The wraith broke out of the circle that I drew around Ginny and Hermione. That's never happened before." The agent on the couch took a moment to run her fingers through her short, red hair. Her gaze traveled around the room, anything to not look at her therapist. "I mean, it isn't like I don't know what I'm doing. I've done exorcisms before. Even the idiot they sent for backup wasn't totally useless. It should have gone off without a hitch. It's the 'ritual'," she spat the word out in disgust, "that's the problem. It's too complicated. Why do you need the candles and the circle? What's the point of the noise? It makes no sense. There has to be a better way. A few words, the right flick of the wand and it's done. This archaic crap has to go. I wanna know what bonehead thought all of that up, anyway." It took her a moment to realize what she had just said. She hastily added, "No offense."

"None taken, I assure you," said Nurse Mirrad in his usual calm manner. "I endeavor to not take anything my patients say personally. I believe that would be counterproductive."

"Well, I'm sorry anyway," mumbled Agent Decima.

"Accepted," said Mirrad in the same serene way. He put his notebook down to give her a Minbari bow, his hands forming a triangle at chest level. "Now, I believe I may have something for you to think about between sessions. Consider the fact that exorcisms happen in the PPC on a daily basis. The methods that we employ are well tested. I suggest that, perhaps, it is not a failing of the ritual, but a failing of faith that caused the incident during your last mission. You say you are sure there is a better way, a simpler way. I think that you should find a method of exorcising wraiths that you can believe in. You come from a world where magic is more academic than in others; perhaps a more scientific approach would be more appropriate?"

Agent Decima was embarrassed. She spent the whole time that Mirrad was talking looking at a sandal that he kept on his desk. She was a witch, dammit! Faith shouldn't even factor in to it.

This inner monologue would have continued, but Mirrad's voice had changed. "Agent Decima, are you feeling well?"

Decima looked at him. His face betrayed nothing, but his voice had an edge of worry. She wondered what he was so worried about. Then she realized that her cheeks were tacky. Had she been crying? She didn't remember crying. What in Merlin's name was wrong with her today?

"I'm fine." She started rubbing at her cheeks, giving away the lie. "Just a little frustrated, I suppose. Are we done?"

"For the moment," replied the Minbari. "I will expect you to stop in for another session when you have the time."

Decima got up from the couch and moved to the door. "I will," she lied again. "It might be a while, though. You know how these things go."

"I do. Which is why I will remind you that the Queen Anne's Lace receives my reports and may begin to wonder if she only gets one."

"Fine! I'll come back after my next mission." That should give her some time. She didn't even have a partner. They wouldn't send her out again before they fixed that . . . would they?

"Very well. I will walk you out. It is almost time for my shift to start at the front desk."

Finally! Decima opened the door and headed into the hallway. She strode purposefully down the halls and Mirrad followed, a short distance behind her. The two passed through the unit in silence except for the click of Decima's boots on the generic surface and the swishing of their robes.

As they neared the front desk, and Decima's blessed freedom, they were met by the voice of an innocent in distress.

"Listen, Agent Supernumerary, I'm sorry, but I really don't know. It's not the same here—I predicted tantaflaf night in the Cafeteria yesterday, but last week I predicted the Assimilation Crisis right in front of Nurse Dewstan. I don't remember what I said to you, but it's probably meaningless." The voice belonged to the young blond man behind the desk, and while its essence was calm and dreamy, full of genuine regret at being unable to help, it was scattered with nightmarish notes of panic. Sixteen-year-old Alex Bjørnsen hadn't been a nurses' assistant for very long, and he was unaccustomed to facing the kind of impatience that could be brought to bear by an agent trying to act like it was his idea to be someplace he'd been ordered by a Flower.

"How can you not—" Nume cut himself off and pressed his lips together before starting over. "I don't have time for this. Who's supposed to be here? Last I heard, they didn't leave interns in charge of the nurses' station."

"That would be me," said Mirrad, coming to the rescue of the hapless assistant. "I am glad to see you again, Agent Supernumerary. Have you come for an appointment?"

Decima took the opportunity to sidle toward the door. She didn't want any part of whatever was going on.

"Huh," Nume scoffed. He turned to face the Minbari. "No. I'm looking for Agent Decima. I was told she'd be here, but this kid was no help."

Decima froze at the sound of her name and then slowly turned to face everyone. "Why are you looking for her?" she inquired. She didn't know this man from Adam and was definitely not a fan of the attitude he had displayed so far.

Before Nume could answer with more than a raised eyebrow, Mirrad interjected, "As I am sure you are aware, Agent Supernumerary, we are not permitted to disclose patient information. That includes such things as who is currently in session. It would impede progress if you were to barge in on them."

Nume sighed. "The only privacy around here comes from keeping your damn mouth shut. I didn't say she was a patient, just that she was here. And I know she's been short a partner. Lucky day, today it's me. The Flowers are showing us how much they care about our progress again, isn't that nice?" Sar-Plasm™ started to ooze from the walls.

The Minbari looked at the goo on the walls. "Intern Bjørnsen, please inform Janitorial that Agent Supernumerary has been to visit. They will want to clean this up before it dries." He turned back to Nume. "I regret to inform you that your new partner is no longer here. She ran out the door while we were talking. If you leave now, you may catch her. Have a pleasant day, Agent Supernumerary." The last sentence was directed at Nume's back as he cursed and sprinted through the doors.

Decima ran through the halls. She wasn't ready for a new mission, and they couldn't make her go on one if she didn't have a partner. So, she reasoned, they couldn't make her go if her new partner couldn't catch her. She could hear him behind her, yelling for her to stop. She cursed her short legs and lack of athletic ability. He was going to catch her if she didn't do something. She dodged other agents, looking for anything she could use. She saw a female agent from the archives, carrying a thick folder full of papers. Decima took aim with her shoulder and slammed through the folder, sending it, along with far more papers than it should have held, flying. She stumbled and yelled an apology over her shoulder to the now disheveled agent. Decima looked back long enough to see Nume charge through the cloud of papers, one arm held up to protect his face, the other windmilling for balance. The man had longer legs than could possibly be legal and he was quickly catching up.

When Decima turned to look where she was going, she found herself staring at a fruit cart that had rolled out of a connecting hallway. She was barely able to avoid slamming into it, and her robes caught a wooden pin that was, apparently, holding one side in place. Various citrus fruits cascaded from the cart. _Why do we have a fruit cart? What possible purpose could that serve?_ she thought as she ran on.

It served to trip up Nume, at any rate: he was right behind her and got caught in the cascade, stumbling to one knee when his foot came down on a lime. He picked himself up again, hissing curses through his teeth, and lunged after the escaping woman. In four paces, he was close enough to reach out and grab her by the shoulder.

"Just _stop_ , will you?" he said in a ragged breath as he spun her around.

His vision exploded into whiteness. He staggered back a step and shook his head, and the whiteness filled with black specks. Taking off his glasses didn't help. More calmly than he would have believed possible after being slapped, he said, "You bitch. What the hell?"

"Oh my god," she said, shocked at her own reaction. "I'm so sorry. Did I hurt you?"

"Yes, it frelling hurt! Christ!" There, there was the anger. Good. He blinked furiously, trying to get his sight back to normal, and probed the side of his face. He could still feel the sting.

"Well . . . you shouldn't grab people like that, then!"

"Well, you shouldn't have run!"

"You were chasing me!"

"You ran away first!"

"Because you were so damned pissed off in FicPsych! Pissed-off people looking for you is generally a good sign that running should happen!"

"I'm not pissed at _you_ , I'm pissed at the Lichen for sending me on a mission with some stranger out of spite. I'm not _happy_."

"Oh . . . ." She wasn't quite sure how to respond to that. It hadn't occurred to her that someone else might be a victim here.

"Yeah." Nume could see again, more or less, and he slipped his green-framed glasses back on so he could focus on the woman without squinting. "So. You're Agent Decima. Of Bad Slash," he added grimly.

"Yes," she said. "And you are . . . ?" It had only now occurred to her to find out who she had slapped.

"Agent Supernumerary, Implausible Crossovers." He pointed to the Flying Pig flash patch on his shoulder. "The Lichen told me it'd get a mission sent to your console." He raised an eyebrow meaningfully.

"Of course he did," she said with a sigh. "My RC is a mess at the moment; my old partner used to do the cleaning. Follow me." She headed off, trying to distract herself enough to make it a short trip. If this was going to happen, then it was going to happen quickly. "So . . . any clue where that fruit cart came from?"

Nume shrugged. "There's always a fruit cart in chase scenes. Also, citrus prevents scurvy."

* * *

RC 9¾ was about average, as far as response centers go. It had bunk beds that folded up against the wall, to give extra space to move in the tiny room. It also had a bathroom in which you could likely use the shower, sink, and toilet at the same time, without moving. It wasn't much, but Rockheart, the mini-Aragog, called it home. He had built himself a lovely guitar-shaped web in one corner and even allowed a human to use the rest of the space. He was idly strumming the stings of his web when his human returned.

"Forgive the mess," said Decima as she led the way into the room. "Can you check on the mission while I grab a few things?"

"Yeah, sure."

Nume supposed the unstowed and unmade lower bunk coupled with a green-and-black striped sock in the middle of the floor counted for mess, though even by his standards it wasn't much. Without commenting, he hit the button under the flashing green light on the console and peered at the Intelligence report that came up.

He peered a little more.

"God dammit," he said to himself. Then, louder, "Do you know anything about _Twilight_?"

Decima stopped digging through her closet and looked at Nume for a moment. She blushed, looked away, and said, "I . . . _mumble mutter_  . . . ."

"I see." He sighed and massaged the spot between his eyebrows. "Should we be packing Anti-Lustin?"

"NO!" she exclaimed, flushing an even deeper shade of red. "I said I've seen the movies, and I think the background characters are kind of interesting, but there's no reason to bring Anti-Lustin into this."

Nume put a hand up defensively. "Okay, fine." He changed the subject, curling his lip at what he had to report. "Intel says pretty much everyone is in bed with everyone else, and there's MPreg" —he shuddered— "so that's your ballgame. In mine . . . it's post–Battle of Hogwarts, and _Harry Potter_ characters end up in Forks for some reason. I'll get them back to England once you've exorcised them. My partner has all my equipment, though, so I'll have to borrow yours."

"A crossover? I've never actually worked one of those. Are the standard CAD and remote activator good enough, or do you need something more specialized?"

"I'll make up my mind when I get there," Nume said. "The Despatch kit isn't always necessary—it's not like anyone is going to be poisoned by eating food from the other 'verse in this case. Let's go."

"If we need anything else, we can always just portal back, right?" She pulled her bag on and adjusted the single strap. That done, she punched in the co-ordinates and opened the portal. "Shall we?" Without waiting for his reply, she strode through.

They hadn't set disguises, so Nume got to step into a badfic in his own skin for the first time since Ilraen had broken their disguise generator four years ago. According to the Words, the sun had just gone down, and it was dark in Malfoy Manor. There wasn't much to see until something moved in the middle of the floor.

Nume pulled his notebook out of his pocket. "Coffins in Malfoy Manor. Never a good sign," he whispered.

"You've obviously never been to one of their parties," commented Decima with a grin. The grin was short-lived, however.

A coffin opened, releasing Luna Lovegood.

Decima's jaw dropped. What, in the name of all that was magical, was Luna doing in a coffin, let alone a coffin in Malfoy Manor? Then she noticed the dark eyes and fangs. "They . . . turned Luna into a vampire?" she whispered. "They turned _Luna Lovegood_ into a _vampire?_ " She wasn't whispering anymore and her face was growing red again.

"Shh." Nume shot her a reproachful look. Not that either of them could see very well. "Calm down, it's only the first paragraph. Are you a spaz or something?"

Decima regained her composure, with some difficulty. "I'm just . . . " she tried to explain. "She's so innocent and care-free. She'd be a terrible vampire." Time for a change of subject, before she started babbling. "And the coffin thing. _Twilight_ vampires don't sleep in coffins. Hell, they don't sleep at all. They aren't the classic Dracula-types. That's a charge."

"Maybe. We don't know very much about vampires in Potterverse. It might be passable with their rules, though it would be nice if the narrative specified which ones are in effect." He frowned, tapping his pen against the pad. "Well, come on, she's moving."

They followed Luna out of the room and stopped short.

"That's exceedingly odd," Nume said, looking the hallway up one way and down the other. "It's got to be a quarter of a mile in either direction, at least."

"The Words say this is ' _the_ hallway of the Manor'," noted Decima. "I guess every room in Malfoy Manor opens onto this hallway now. I imagine it would make it really easy to find your way around. Just have to know that the bathroom is the four-hundred seventh door on the left."

Nume grunted a laugh and led the way after Luna again. The agents had plenty of time to catch up before she reached her destination. This was never described in detail, but it was at the extreme end of the hallway and had a door to the outside in it, so it was probably some sort of front room.

Luna found Harry Potter in Draco Malfoy's lap. Harry rushed to her and, after asking how she'd slept, ran his fingers over three scars on her neck.

Decima squinted and asked, "Do those scars look like Mick Jagger to you?"

"What?" Nume looked at the scars, blinked, and looked at the Words. "'Three jaggar-like gashes', it says, given to her by Death Eaters. Guess that was the best the universe could do with it. Must've been some torture."

"Rockheart would get a kick out of that. The little guy loves the Rolling Stones."

> Draco snorted from his seat. Harry, faster than a human could blink an eye, was straddling his lover, fangs bare and eyes a bright shade of green. Draco only smirked and captured his lips in a searing kiss.

Luna and Nume both turned away from the display of affection. Decima didn't even bat an eye.

"What's the matter?" she asked her temporary partner. "This isn't even that bad."

Nume gave her a sneer for her mocking tone. "There's a reason I'm in the DIC. Nobody should be writing this, let alone putting it out in public. It's indecent."

"Indecent? There is nothing indecent about two men kissing, in private or in public. That kind of mentality went out of fashion in the seventies." She glared at him.

He raised an eyebrow. "I was born in nineteen fifty. I'm _from_ the seventies. Also, I don't care one whit whether it's two men, a man and a woman, or the Giant Squid and Hogwarts Castle: I don't want to know about it. Okay?"

Decima was a little stunned at being so dead on with her accusations. Things like that just didn't happen. "So, what you're telling me is that you're not interested in seeing anything like this? Like, _ever?_ " Nume didn't respond. She shook her head. "I can't believe they sent me a prude."

The disentangler curled his lip. "I told you, the Lichen has it in for me. Blame the mutant plant thing."

"I believed you the first time. I wanna know what _I_ did to the Lichen to deserve this."

Just then, a sound reverberated through the room.

"Was that a gong?" Nume looked around for the instrument, happily dropping the conversation. "What the hell is a gong—" He checked the Words. "Oh. 'The door rang'. Classy."

"It's the Malfoys' house. Class is what they do." She smirked and watched as Luna opened the door.

Ron, an obviously pregnant Hermione, George, and, most surprisingly, Fred walked in. Ron enthusiastically greeted Luna while the agents tilted their heads.

"I thought this was after the war," Nume said, scanning through the Words.

He didn't get very far: a voice announced, _vox dei_ , that "yes Fred is alive in this," saving him the trouble. He was not grateful.

The agents took in this new information as Ron and Luna hugged. Nume, keeping one eye on the Words, picked up an interesting line: "She hugged him back, careful of his neck. She didn't want Hermione to raise their child alone."

"Wait, what?" the agent said. "That's completely ambiguous! Is Ron the father, or just a surrogate?"

"Reads to me like we might have some Femme-Preg going on here," commented Decima.

Nume sputtered before finally spitting out, "You have a _word_ for that?"

"Doesn't everyone?" she said with as straight a face as possible.

Nume opened his mouth to protest, caught her expression, and pulled out his Bleepka flask instead.

Meanwhile, the room resolved itself into a parlor and the characters sat down for a round of pointless exposition. Ron made small talk, Ginny went ballistic, and only one of the twins ever did anything.

"What was the point of having both of them if you're just going to ignore one?" asked Decima of the disembodied announcer. She never did get an answer.

"So Harry, Draco, and Luna are going to America. Because Luna feels like it," Nume said, picking the pertinent information out of the dross. "Whoopie. Scene change ahead."

Decima took the RA out of her bag and was about to activate it when Draco did something completely unexpected.

> Ginny's back hit the wall before anyone could intervene. Draco's eyes were a bright gray, like starlight, but with a tint of blood to them, his fangs bare and his hand clamped around her neck, crushing down on her windpipe.
> 
> "Say it again you _filthy little blood traitor_!" he hissed out. "Say that _my mate_ has gone _delusional_ because he is in love with another man."

"I'm impressed," said Decima. "Despite the starlight-and-blood eyes, Draco actually seems to be in character."

Nume nodded. "Close, anyway. Draco was never that physical—he had cronies for that. Of course, he was never a vampire, either.  . . . Do we know _why_ they're vampires?"

"It hasn't been covered yet. Shall we portal?" She used the RA to open a portal to Forks, and the second half of the chapter.

They stepped into a bedroom filled with a man's "loud painful screams of agony," and Nume immediately flushed bright red and turned around to face the wall. "Jacob Black is in labor," he grated out, taking the Obvious Statement Award for the day.

"Probably due to him having some hot man-sex," remarked Decima with as much nonchalance as she could manage. "This is going to be interesting, though. You rarely get to see an actual MPreg birth. You're gonna want to remember this."

"Fuck you." Nume pointedly took a deep gulp from his hip flask—as pointedly as possible while being very careful not to look in any direction that might bring the miraculous event into his field of vision.

"What? This is fascinating. I wish I'd thought to bring my camera." She was watching the scene with genuine interest when Bella and Edward entered the room. She grabbed Nume and pushed him into a nearby closet. Nume quickly shook her off of him.

"YOU BASTARD!" Jacob yelled. "THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT! I AM _NOT_ LETTING YOU TOUCH ME _EVER AGAIN_! YOU SON OF A-" A rogue hyphen cut his rant short.

"Why," Nume growled, "is Jacob Black pregnant with Edward Cullen's baby?"

"I have no idea," said Decima. "Vampires and werewolves are natural enemies, and these two are supposed to hate each other with a passion that even their racial hatred doesn't account for." She thought about it for a moment. "I guess if they didn't have to fight over Bella anymore . . . ?"

"The Words don't say _anything_ about it," the disentangler complained. "Just that Bella thinks of Edward as a brother-figure now. _Why_ , dammit?"

"We can always hope that it will be explained later," said Decima, "though this makes two major changes that have gone unexplained. I wouldn't count on getting any answers."

The agents were trapped in the closet with nothing to do but listen to Jacob scream for the next fifteen minutes. At that point, Carlisle arrived, which caused Bella and Edward to run to the woods for no apparent reason. Thirty seconds later, the baby was born and gave its first cry. Edward and Bella tried to re-enter, only to be stopped by Rosalie, who hadn't been there a minute ago. The agents couldn't see very well through the wooden slats in the closet door, but they could hear Rosalie:

> "One dog is enough," she snapped, "but not two. Get out of this house!"

"Wait a minute," whispered Decima, "isn't this Jacob and Edward's bedroom? And Bella was definitely sleeping in this house. Why does Rosalie have a problem with her being here now? It isn't like this is Rosalie's house."

"More to the point," Nume responded, checking the Words against what he thought he was hearing, " _why the fuck is Bella a werewolf?_ Explain, story! _Explain!_ "

"Dude, chill out," whispered the Bad Slasher. "Do you really want a room full of vampires and werewolves to hear you right now?"

He shook his head, breathing deeply, and went back to the Words. He squinted. "Hey. You better look at this paragraph, right after Jasper talks. Never mind where he came from—does this seem right to you?"

Decima read the paragraph in question. "Wait, so . . . Alice is with _Laurent?_ She's supposed to be with Jasper, and Laurent is supposed to be with Irina." She read further. "Irina is with Felix of the Volturi now? And Jasper is with Kate? How does that make any sense? Kate is supposed to be with Garrett. It's like they're playing Musical Relationships."

Nume watched her confusion with some pleasure, and finally a laugh. "Apparently the only one left out was werewolf!Bella. Speaking of freaks of nature, you want to do something about that abomination now, or later?"

He gestured into the bedroom, where Edward was just showing off his shiny new assbaby to Bella. It was apparently a "pale skinned, copper haired, chocolate eyed baby girl" that "looked more like Edward than Jacob but still had some of Jake to her, with high cheekbones and a smile that just screamed her maternal father."

The agents took a moment to recover from the eerie un-sound of the screaming smile and the existence of the phrase "maternal father."

"Merlin's beard," said Decima, when she had gotten her senses back. She heard Edward talking in the room and did a double-take. "They named Edward and _Jacob's_ baby after Edward's parents and _Bella's adoptive_ parents? Bella wasn't adopted and the naming makes no sense."

"Yes, but what are you going to do with it?" Nume rubbed at one ear. "We're not taking it back to Headquarters, I'll tell you that."

"I don't know," admitted Decima. "Something about this just isn't right."

"What, like everything?"

"No," said Decima as she reached into her bag. "Something more specific than that. The description of the baby is almost exactly what I would expect for Renesmee Cullen." She pulled a CAD out and pointed it at the baby.

[Renesmee Carlie Sarah(?) Cullen. Half-vampire, half- … analyzing … analyzing … human. Jacob, you are not the father ... mother ... whatever. Canon. OOC 0.00%]

"I knew it." Decima looked up from the readout. "They stole Bella's baby and stuck it up Jacob's ass."

"Well, at least we didn't have to watch Edward rip it out of there with his teeth."

"Yeah. I mean, I don't mind a little biting, but there's a limit, right?"

Nume stared at her. "I'm glad. I'm _really_ glad we're not partners."

"Eh . . . you're not my type, anyway. On to chapter two?" She opened a portal.

"Thank Christ." He took a deep, brain-cleansing swig of Bleepka and went through.

Bella had driven her truck "home to her fathers," and the agents found themselves crouching under a staircase in their two-story house. Bella rushed in through the front door and was greeted by Teddy Lupin, sporting blue hair and neon-green eyes.

> "Bella!" he called spotting his older sister standing there in the doorway. "There's a shifter from La Push here. He wanted to speak to Pop and Padfoot."

"She's Lupin's daughter?" asked Decima. "How is she Lupin's daughter? Tonks had a terrible time trying to get him to have Teddy; it doesn't make sense that he would have had a kid before that. I guess this is our explanation for Bella being a werewolf, though."

Nume shook his head. "That's a stupid explanation. I did Magical Heredity at HFA—it's not entirely clear whether lycanthropy is genetic in Potterverse, but there's more evidence against than for. Look at Teddy."

"That's true. Though I would rather not look at Teddy right now. His hair gives me headaches and _by the Dark Lord's undershorts do you see what she just pulled out of her sleeve?_ "

It was a wand.

"Dibs," Nume said. "That's going on my wall. What do you think's in it, werewolf hair? Vampire sparkles?"

"Does it not bother you that Bella Swan has an instrument of magic in her hand? I almost soiled my robes over here."

"Not half so much as Jacob's transplanted assbaby. Fair's fair." He smirked mirthlessly.

"I swear, you make less and less sense the longer I know you." She shook her head. "Come on, then."

The agents followed Bella upstairs, where she talked with Sirius Black, who was alive and working for the Ministry of Magic. Nume and Decima were unsurprised both that this happened and that it went unexplained. Sam Uley was talking to Lupin about the vampires that would be arriving and how he didn't want them anywhere near La Push. Sam eventually stormed out and Lupin had a short talk with Bella about Harry, Draco, and Luna.

The agents were surprised about one thing that happened. Bella made a comment about the people of Forks calling Van Helsing if they ever found out how many vampires, werewolves, and wizards were living there.

Decima stifled a laugh as the canons headed for the stairs. "You have to admit," she said to Nume, "that was kind of funny."

"Not enough to save this fic," he said, but he was nodding.

Downstairs, the doorbell—thankfully not the whole door this time—rang, and the agents trailed down the stairs just enough to get a view of the proceedings. Their good vantage point didn't avail them much, though. At first, all they could see was "a blur of black and white" and "another blur" standing in the doorway.

Nume took his glasses off and put them back on a few times, squinting. "Huh. Harry and Draco are all—oh, there they go," he amended as they resolved. "Weird description. It's not like they were moving."

"No idea. It almost looks like they Apparated, but why ring the doorbell, wait for an answer, and _then_ Apparate into the house?" She was puzzled. Then she looked out the door and saw Luna. Decima made a small noise in her throat at the sight of the blonde vampire, which was good. It kept the agent from laughing. Luna was wearing burgundy tights, a bright blue skirt that came to her knees, and an emerald green blouse that "[added] a bush to her small breasts." It was ridiculous, even for her.

"Well." Nume's jaw muscles flexed as he worked to keep a straight face. "I think we can add fashion crimes to the charge list."

"We should alert the Knights Who Say Ni," suggested Decima.

"Yes, they'll want their shrubbery back."

Decima was about to respond when Luna skipped over to Bella.

> "And you must be Bella. I'm very pleased to meet you."
> 
> Then she kissed her.

Decima had time to make a strangled noise before an unforeseen chapter break rippled through the scene, throwing everything into shadow until the chapter three header passed over. The agents grabbed onto the stair railing, and Decima did not immediately blow their cover in shock and outrage.

When things had settled back to normal, Decima pulled her wand out of her robes. She had the look of someone about to do something really dumb. Nume was very familiar with this look, so he quickly put out a hand and grabbed her by the wrist.

"What the hell are you doing?" he demanded through clenched teeth.

Decima turned to him and said, simply, "I am going to kill that werewolf bitch." There were tears in her eyes.

Nume stared, thinking uncharitable thoughts about the Lichen, Decima, agents in general, and Ilraen in particular for leaving him to get stuck in this mess, before what was actually going on clicked into place. "Oh, _Jesus_. No. I _knew_ we should've packed Anti-Lustin. No, dammit, you're not killing anyone because your Lust Object is snogging another woman. Just forget about it, hear me?"

Decima tried to pull her wrist from his grasp. This might have worked if not for the fact that they were standing on stairs. Her foot went out behind her to hold her weight and provide leverage, only to make her overbalance and begin to fall. The only thing that prevented her untimely demise was Nume's grip, for which she was now very thankful. The shock was enough to snap her out of her rage. When she finally took stock of herself, she was clinging to Nume's waist with her heart pounding.

Nume carefully plucked her arms away from him, wearing a look associated with removing an old banana peel that hadn't quite made it into the trash the first time. "If you're done now, Draco just hauled Luna outside. He looked pissed."

"I'm so sorry. I don't usually have this problem when she's around. The kiss just came out of nowhere, is all." Decima was babbling in her attempts to explain. She would have continued to do so, if not for Draco's voice coming from outside.

> "What in the seven gates of hell were you thinking Luna? You just _snogged_ someone you don't even know! Are you mental?"

Then he screamed.

The agents shared a puzzled look and turned in unison to the Words.

"She developed a 'hellfire backbone'?" asked Decima in shocked disbelief. "She'll kill _in cold blood?_ That is not my Luna!"

Nume grimaced. "I should start a misspelled curses collection. 'Curcio'?" He shook his head. "Also, apparently she's a Seer and Bella has been haunting her dreams. Would've been nice to get a hint of this plot device before now. Oh, and feel free to kill her—she's definitely a replacement and we're running out of fic."

"First we need to hide. Everyone is headed back this way." She took a moment to scan the Words. "Upstairs, find the teenage girl's room and get in the closet."

"Oh, the irony," Nume mumbled, retreating up the stairs. It wasn't too hard to determine which room belonged to Bella: the miasma of angst and hormones was unmistakable. They managed to cram themselves into the closet just before Luna entered and went to the bed. Bella was quick to follow, closing the door and joining her vampire crush. Bella cuddled up close, their hands intertwined, and Luna sang quietly.

"What do we do?" asked Decima, who was having trouble focusing on the job with Luna singing like that. "I don't fancy trying to exorcise two witches right now. Especially when one of them is . . . a werewolf, too." That last bit hadn't been what she set out to say.

"I don't care," Nume whispered. "Stun them, anything."

"Right. Stun them. On three? Yeah, three's good." She took a deep breath to steady herself and drew her wand. "Three!" She kicked the door of the closet open. Luna and Bella both jumped. Luna was quick to reach for her wand. Decima cast a Full Body-Bind Curse on her. She followed it up by casting the curse a second time at Bella. In the few seconds that had elapsed, the two girls had gone from lying down to sitting up and back to lying down, in quick succession.

Nume stepped up from behind Decima, who was breathing heavily, black notebook in hand. He bent to reach up Bella's sleeve and take her wand away, then straightened and cleared his throat. "Right, I'll make this quick. Doppelgänger, alias Luna Lovegood, you are hereby charged with crimes against the _Harry Potter_ and _Twilight_ continua, to wit: the wrongful and utterly failed impersonation of a canon character; being a party to an implausible crossover; being a party to illogical romantic pairings; employing bad plot devices; causing Malfoy Manor to only contain a single hallway and other counts of bad description; committing fashion crimes; attempting to use an Unforgivable Curse; being a vampire for no good reason; and not ever explaining a damn thing. For these crimes, your punishment is death, and I don't think you can actually speak through a Body-Bind, so—!" He cut off what he was about to say when Luna's arm shot up, wand in hand.

" _Avada Kedavra!_ " A green bolt shot from the end of Luna's wand straight at Decima. The agent didn't have time to react. The spell struck Decima, who flew back and slammed into the wall. She lay face down, unmoving.

"Shit!" At the speed of thought, Nume brought Bella's wand to bear and fired off a return curse at the impostor. " _Avada Kedavra!_ " It worked, and a bolt with far too many sparkles in it sprang forth and hit her in the chest. She collapsed and lay still. Nume turned the wand on Bella. "You're not trying anything, are you? _ARE YOU?_ "

Bella still couldn't move, so she couldn't shake her head, and her wide, frightened eyes said she wouldn't try.

Nume spun around and knelt over Decima. "Shit, shit, shit . . . ." He turned her over. She groaned as he moved her. He heaved a sigh. " _Shit_. Okay, come on now. You're okay." He gave her shoulder a shake.

Decima's eyes fluttered open and she brought a hand to the back of her head. "Ow."

"Here." He pulled his flask out of its holster and unscrewed the top. "This'll help."

Decima took a small mouthful, with his help. She swallowed and coughed. "Ugh. That is terrible. Who would willingly drink that?"

Nume raised an eyebrow. "It's _Bleepka_. Lots of people drink it. Anyway, who are you to complain?"

"Point taken. What happened with Luna?"

"Taken care of. Lucky for me, this wand works, though I doubt I'll try it again. Too sparkly."

Decima levered herself up onto her elbows. "Help me up. We've got a lot to do before I can get to Medical."

"We can start by exorcising Bella." He pulled Decima to her feet.

Decima looked over at the pair on the bed. Her breath caught in her throat as she looked at Luna, lying dead in the bed. Tears welled up. "I can't do this," she said. "I've had enough problems with exorcisms recently. I don't think I can do this with her lying there."

With respect for her close shave with death, Nume bit back a cynical remark about emotions. "Fine. Gimme your bag."

Decima handed the bag over and he got to work. He started with Bella, and then the pair moved on to rounding up the rest of the cast. Nume had a hard time exorcising in the name of Meyer, but he managed. After he had exorcised Harry and Draco, he and Decima wiped off the white make-up that their faces had been caked in, as well as removing the colored contact lenses and fake vampire teeth. Lupin and Sirius were nowhere to be found, which likely meant that they were dead again.

When all and sundry had been returned to their rightful states, the agents had to get the _Harry Potter_ characters back to their native England.

Decima reached into her bag and pulled out the RA. When she went to put in coordinates, she noticed that the casing was a little blackened. When she read the screen, she called Nume over. Burned into it were the words "He's dead, Jim."

"Well," Nume said. "Well." He licked his lips. "Fuck."

"This explains why I'm not dead," said Decima. "Not that I really cared _why_." She sat down heavily on the staircase's bottom step.

Nume paced in front of her and raked a hand through his hair, its light coating of hardened gel holding it askew afterward. "Why do we only ever carry _one_ RA? That's _insane_. I don't want to die in _Twilight_!" With nothing better to do, he finally dropped down beside Decima. "I don't want to be stuck with you, either."

"I am _so_ sad to hear that," she said, with as much sarcasm as she could muster. "Here I was thinking we could start a life together in Forks. Since that doesn't seem likely, would you mind helping me think of a way out of this?"

"Yeah, yeah, I—hey! You lot get back here!" Nume jumped to his feet again and chased after Harry, Draco, and Teddy, who were making a break for the front door now that the Body-Binds holding them were wearing off. He pointed his souvenir wand at them, which at least looked threatening enough to those without one. "Just take a seat, all right? We're trying to figure out how to get you three home."

"Why not just Apparate?" asked Draco, sounding like it was something a first year could have figured out. "You've got your wands. I'm disappointed that the Slytherin hasn't thought of that yet."

Decima was disappointed that she hadn't thought of it, too. That didn't stop her from thinking of Draco as a snobbish little shit, but some Slytherins would consider that a compliment. "Right. Nume, you ever done that before?"

"No," he answered, glaring a warning against looking too smug at the boy. "It never came up."

Decima thought for a moment before saying, "Give your wand to Draco. Draco, take them to Diagon Alley and you can all be on your way." That last was said over Nume's protesting.

"Why don't you just take us all Side-Along?" the agent demanded. "Not only do I not trust this kid, splitting the party at this juncture strikes me as a really stupid idea."

"This kid was the only one of us smart enough to think of Apparating," said Decima. "He'll get you where you need to go. Then you can get your wand back and wait for me at the Leaky Cauldron. I have a stop to make."

Nume attempted to stare her down, but finally relented. He wasn't going to win this one. "Fine. Make it quick." He handed the wand hilt-first to Draco. "Be careful, it's not exactly standard issue."

Harry was not happy about Draco being the only one of them with a wand, but there wasn't much he could do except direct Teddy to hold Draco's hand and then put his own hand on Draco's shoulder. Nume took the other shoulder and had just enough time to give Decima one more look of resentment before they all turned on the spot and were gone.

* * *

It took Decima almost half an hour to make it to Diagon Alley. She Apparated just outside of Olivander's and headed for the Leaky Cauldron. She was glad to be back in the Wizarding community. Headquarters was nice on occasion, but it just wasn't the same.

When she entered the Cauldron, she didn't have to look very hard to find Agent Supernumerary. He was sitting in a corner, not talking to anyone, and trying his hardest to make sure the room knew that he was not happy. Well . . . maybe not his _hardest_. She thought it might be in her best interest to have a drink before she went to collect her partner.

Nume watched her with a scowl as she went up to the bar—as if he hadn't already been left here waiting long enough. He kept it up as she approached and sat down with her firewhiskey. "It's about time," he said. "Did you get lost?"

Sufficiently insulted by the implication that she didn't know her way around her home continuum, Decima almost spilled some of her drink when she used it to gesture. "I will remind you that I have had a hard day. When you have nearly been killed by your . . . ." She hesitated, took a swallow of her firewhiskey, and continued. "Well, when you have nearly died, then you can complain."

Nume, who had nearly died once or twice, just grunted at that. "Whatever. Where did you go, anyway?"

Decima stared into her glass and said, "Let us just say that her skeleton will lie in the Chamber forever."

He nodded. "Fine. I sent Draco, Harry, and Teddy off by the Floo Network, so they ought to be all right. I also had plenty of time to think," he said pointedly, "and I have some ideas about how to get out of the pickle we've landed in."

"Ideas are good," said Decima. "Can't say that I've come up with anything. Let's hear what you've got."

"First of all, we're not done until we find the real Luna and make sure she's neuralyzed and put back where she belongs. I figure we should look in Malfoy Manor. There has to be a plothole around there, and once we get Luna out of it, that's our ticket home."

"Right, Luna comes first. I'm not sure I follow you on the plothole being our ticket home. We don't have the technology to stabilize it."

The man shook his head. "Don't need it. Plotholes work because you want them to. All you need is sufficient willpower, though a little magical boost wouldn't hurt. Apparate us through the plothole to your RC." He gave her a level look, waiting to see how she would handle the idea.

Decima considered it. "You know this is insane, right? I mean, who knows what an unstable plothole would do with the magic involved? We could end up anywhere. And that's only if we're recognizable when we come out the other end. This isn't something we should even be considering." She downed the rest of her firewhiskey. "Why the hell not? It's not like this day can get any worse."

They left the pub and Disapparated from the courtyard out back, reappearing with a crack in the half-mile-long hallway of Malfoy Manor. It was quiet, not even a House-elf moving around within earshot. Nume led the way to the room full of coffins.

"This is the one she was in," he said, picking it out from memory. "Ready?"

"Let's do this." She pointed her wand and cast the Hover Charm. The lid floated off the coffin and moved to the side.

Nume reached into the apparently empty space and, after some feeling around, his arm sank through the bottom up to his shoulder. "Found it. Now . . . hey in there! Luna Lovegood! Take my hand and I'll pull you out!" After a moment, he braced himself and pulled, and the silvery-haired girl popped out of the plothole.

Luna took in her surroundings with her usual dreamy air. "Thank you for pulling me out, but if you'll excuse me, I believe there was a Crumple-Horned Snorkack in there. I'll only be a moment." She turned to reenter the coffin.

"No!" Decima grabbed Luna's shoulders and pulled her back. A moment later, she realized that she was touching Luna Lovegood and let go as if she'd been shocked. The agent's face turned as red as her hair.

Nume shook his head and sighed as he pulled Decima's neuralyzer and sunglasses out of his pocket and slipped the latter onto his face. They weren't a good fit, but they worked. "Miss Lovegood, if you would please look here before you go, I believe you'll find this interesting." His heart wasn't in it, but the ever-curious Luna looked eagerly. One flash later, and she looked exactly the same as she always did. "Okay, Luna, you were looking for signs of the Crumple-Horned Snorkack and took a wrong turn. You're going to go use the front room fireplace to go home and then forget you were ever here. Off you go." He gave her a light push to set her walking out of the room.

Decima took her hand from in front of her eyes and watched Luna go. She heard the familiar whoosh of the Floo Powder and a moment later she was hit with the feeling that a huge weight had been lifted off of the world. Malfoy Manor rippled and the agents found themselves standing in a sitting room that was charming, if lacking in coffins.

Nume dropped to his knees and felt around hurriedly, then almost faceplanted when he succeeded in finding the plothole again. "Thank God. All right, better make it quick if we're going to do this."

Decima took Nume's hand and a breath to steady her nerves, and turned on the spot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We would like to thank the _Twilight_ wiki for making this mission possible. We've only seen the first two movies, and those are scary enough.
> 
> So! What has Ilraen been up to all this time, and will Nume and Decima make it back to HQ in one piece? Go to "Secret Agents" to find out one thing and on to the end to find out the other!
> 
>  **Phobos' Notes:** Nume and Decima are a match made in . . . somewhere that doesn't make very good matches. They sure are fun to watch, though. Also, despite Nume's explanation, I still don't know why there was a fruit cart.
> 
> Many thanks to July for being our beta. It is much appreciated.


	4. Conclusion

Response Center 999 was empty when Ilraen returned. This was strange, but did not immediately concern him: he had a string of charges to take care of, two "Austrailiens," one mini-Aragog, and one little boy. In fact, Ilraen breathed a sigh of relief.

This lasted until young Tommy looked up and realized the hand he was holding no longer belonged to a nice redheaded man, but rather a six-foot-one blue centaur with no mouth and too many eyes. Tommy burst into tears, Ronald Weasly hissed at him, and tiny!Aeryn did what came naturally and fired her itty-bitty pulse pistol at the mini. It lunged at her, and that started a merry five-way chase around the response center. It took what felt like forever to settle everyone down, and it involved trapping Ronald Weasly in the bathroom, separating tiny!Aeryn and tiny!Vala (one on Nume's bunk, the other on the console), and convincing Tommy to stop crying and come out from under Ilraen's work table. The last was only achieved with the lure of chocolate, courtesy of the mini-replicator, and had the unpleasant side-effect of leaving the three-year-old rather sticky.

Ilraen decided to make the Nursery his first stop.

He dropped Tommy off with Miss MacKinnon, a kindly woman with prematurely gray hair in a bun, who typically helped supervise the daycare class. She was fairly new to the Nursery and not quite certain of things like Andalites yet, but that didn't stop her from trying to coax Ilraen into putting his name down as the boy's guardian.

"Children need to know someone cares about them, Agent Ilraen," she said. "I'm sure I've seen you here before, haven't I? Surely you've thought about it."

<Oh, I've been to visit Henry. He is my friend Jenni's son,> Ilraen said quickly. <But . . . > and he hesitated. The little boy was looking up at him, thumb in his mouth and his face all puffy from crying and smeared with chocolate. Ilraen was responsible for that. But . . . . <Miss MacKinnon, I am not a suitable guardian. I . . . I am barely an adult myself,> he admitted. <Also, my partner would kill me.>

She blinked at that, but nodded. "All right, Agent Ilraen. I understand. Well, what about a name, then, or is Tommy all right?"

<I am not sure Agent Thomas would like that,> Ilraen said. <What about something from the _Alex Rider_ continuum? >

So they consulted the Internet via the Nursery's office computer, and together they came up with Ian Thomas Horowitz—"Ian" after the uncle who raised Alex Rider and "Horowitz" after the series' author. Miss MacKinnon made a note to keep track of his speech development, given the terrible grammar his home fic had taught him, but assured Ilraen that he would learn quickly with other children around to set an example. After seeing the newly christened Ian happily playing with Henry and the other toddlers, the Andalite didn't feel too guilty about leaving him.

This time, he was able to take note of the fact that Nume still wasn't in the response center. He would have been interested in the scaled-down Aeryn, but he wouldn't have let her and tiny!Vala bicker like they were in their identical, high-pitched voices. Something about whose behavior was worse and which one should shut up and help the other one escape first was all Ilraen caught as he came in, and then they were both shouting at him.

"You!" went Aeryn, who had a military edge when it came to shouting. "You promised to explain everything! What is this place, and what are you?"

Ilraen turned his ears back—the voice was really irritating—but did his best to answer. He gave his name, species, and position, and went on to explain the PPC as best he could in as few words as possible. Then he had to try to tell the two of them why they were so tiny, and once again, the explanation that a bit of writing had caused the situation did not go over well. Finally, he resorted to playing a random episode of _Farscape_ on the console, and that shut them up.

"So . . . " Vala said after a minute, "does the recording of my world come with a fancy musical score, too?"

Aeryn made a disgruntled noise, but Ilraen nodded. <Yes. Yes, it does.> Vala appeared pleased with this.

<Listen,> Ilraen went on. <There is very little I can do for you here, but I can take you to places where you will be welcome, and where you will be able to learn more about everything. It will have to be all right. You cannot stay here.>

He didn't give them a choice, so they had to agree. For Vala, he opened a portal to the course coordinator's office at the _Stargate_ Official Fanfiction University and left her on the desk, where she was sure to be noticed. For Aeryn, he escorted her down to the PPC Archives, where he knew he'd heard of an Archivist who had a mini-Budong and was certain to be sympathetic. Tiny!Aeryn and Chrichton, the mini, circled each other a few times, to be sure, but it turned out that he was just the right size to serve as a mount for the miniaturized Peacekeeper. Agent Neshomeh allowed as how it would be nice to have some help, and Aeryn pronounced the arrangement satisfactory. She glided away after Neshomeh on Chrichton's back.

That just left Ronald Weasly for Ilraen to deal with. Unfortunately, the mini had spun himself a web in the shower and refused to come out, and Ilraen quite simply could not be bothered to force the issue. He left the bathroom door open, just in case Weasly changed his mind, and went to take a nap.

When he woke up, it was eight hours later. The mini was still in the shower, and there was still no sign of his partner. He checked first for a note (there was none) and then the HQ network's official status.

It read, "Status: Unknown."

This was worrisome.

He went to talk to the Lichen and learned that Nume had been sent on a mission three days ago, about the same time as Ilraen, but as far as the Lichen could tell the mission had been completed in short order: the badfic hadn't registered for over forty-eight hours. Ilraen was on the verge of panic, but suddenly the Lichen's computer screen flickered, reloading the data on display. Agents Decima and Supernumerary now read as "In Headquarters."

The Lichen couldn't blink, but Ilraen blinked enough for two. <Well,> he said. <I apologize for taking up your time.>

_Oh, not at all, dear boy,_ the Director said. _It was an unusual situation. I'm sure your partner will have an interesting story to tell. Anything nasty he says about me is a lie, by the way._

<Er. Of course, my Prince.>

Closing the door to the Lichen's office behind him, Ilraen shook his head and started back for the response center. He would find Nume there and share stories, grab a bite to eat, and then settle down with a nice, relaxing book, no more running around, no more . . . .

He paused. A sound had caught his ear, a nearby voice, although muffled. He listened some more, ears swiveling.

"Yeah, move your hips a little. Almost there." It was a woman's voice. He didn't recognize it, but he did recognize the answering voice.

"Ow! Watch where you put that! Okay, can you feel it?" That was Nume, no mistaking it, and both voices were coming from behind a door to Ilraen's left.

"Just a little more!" cried the female voice. "Just lean a little more. No, the other way! There we go, I've got a hold of it now. Come on! Yes!"

The door burst open. Nume tumbled out and landed flat on his back with a short, red-haired woman on top of him. There was silence. Then Nume coughed, getting his wind back, and the woman, breathing heavily, laid her head on his chest.

"Are you comfy?" Nume demanded. "Can I get you a pillow?"

"That or a cigarette," said Decima. "Your choice."

<Um,> Ilraen said very quietly.

In unison, the two agents looked up and scurried to their feet, straightening themselves out and smoothing down wrinkled clothes and tousled hair. Nume's, however, refused to cooperate and stuck up at odd angles. Feeling Ilraen's eyes on him, he bore down on his partner with a glare.

"What?" said Nume. "You've never seen anyone trapped in a closet before?"

<Um,> said Ilraen. His mental voice quavered, possibly with uncertainty, but possibly on the verge of laughter.

"Shut up." Nume turned to Decima. "Decima, this is my partner. We're going home now. I had a rotten time and I'm glad we're not dead. Don't ever look me up." He put a hand out.

Decima laughed as she took his hand in both of hers. "Aw, sweetie. You just let me know if you ever wanna go again. I have all sorts of interesting things I could show you." One of her hands was lightly stroking the top of his. She had a mischievous glint in her eye and a grin on her face. She broke off the handshake, if you could call it that at this point, and walked past Nume. She started laughing uproariously before she was ten feet down the hall.

"You wipe that smirk off your face," Nume said once she was out of sight. "I've been through _twenty-seven goddamn plotholes_ in the last—I don't even know—and I'm not in the _frelling_ mood." He started in the opposite direction, and Ilraen fell in alongside.

<So,> Ilraen said after a minute. <She seems nice.>

"Shut up!"

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, they were hoping each time that the next leap would be their leap home. No, they didn't change history for the better, although they did run into a very confused hologram at one point.
> 
> We'll probably find out how badly Nume takes a mini-Aragog in the shower next time. Oh, and thanks to doctorlit for making Miss MacKinnon free to use. Her recruitment makes me tear up every time, and she's awesome.
> 
> Thanks again to Guvnor and Phobos for co-writing with me, and to Tranum and July for beta-reading. You guys rock!


End file.
